We Drove to Cali And Got Drunk On the Beach
by piperkathleenpotter
Summary: The summer before Quinn Fabray and Rachel Berry head off to college, their boyfriends, Sam Evans and Noah Puckerman, organize a roadtrip from Lima to So Cal. Fabrevans/Puckleberry
1. Chapter 1

[Lima, Ohio]

**Sam**

The road trip is Puck's idea, but Sam is the one who is chosen to persuade the girls.

"Chicks trust you," Puck explains, elbow deep in the hood of his truck, dark streaks of oil scattered over his forearms like spots on a Dalmatian. "You give off that, I don't know, Mr. Nice Guy vibe."

Sam feels oddly insulted, which Puck must notice, because he adds, "It's a good thing, dude. Just—ask them, okay? They'll listen to you. Especially Quinn, and if she goes, Rachel will go."

_Especially Quinn. _He almost wriggles with pleasure at this qualifier. Puck's lips twitch, but he gives Sam the courtesy of not commenting on the fact the mere mention of his relationship with Quinn turns him into a five-year-old on Christmas morning.

They're sitting in Puck's garage, waiting for their respective girlfriends to show up. Every time Sam hears tires crunch on the patch of gravel in front of Puck's driveway, he leans forward, as if he can see the car through the trees that line the street.

"Dude," Puck says, laughing. "They'll be here."

"I know," he answers, leaning back in his chair self-consciously. "I just—"

Puck extracts himself from the guts of his pick-up, grabbing a rag—which is, in itself, filthy—and wipes his hands and arms with it. "Oh," he says. "I see."

He moves to the mini-fridge in the corner, extracting a Bud Lite and turning to Sam, raising an inquisitive eyebrow, but Sam shakes his head. Ever since "Alcohol Awareness Week" last year, when he woke up with a hangover the size of Texas, not to mention two energetic younger siblings, he's decided that he'll wait to have another drink until he's of age.

"You see what?"

Puck pops the tab on his beer and takes a swig, perches on the fender, and says, "You're _that _couple."

Sam blinks at him. "I don't understand…"

"You're that couple who argues about who is going to hang up first, the one that says _I'll miss you _before you leave, even if you're going to be apart for about twenty minutes," Puck elaborates. "You're the couple that can't keep their hands off each other."

Making an attempt at male bravado despite the blush he knows is staining his cheeks, Sam says, "Well, can you blame me?"

As soon as the words are out of his mouth, Sam regrets them. This is the guy who has a child with Quinn, the one whose glare was hot enough to drill into Sam's back the first time he saw them together in glee club.

Granted, that was a year ago, and he's with Rachel now…but Sam knows from experience that Quinn Fabray isn't the type of girl you can easily get over.

"Hey, man, I'm—"

Puck waves his hand, dismissing Sam's apology before it has even left his mouth. "No, it's cool. I don't blame you at all, actually. Quinn's gorgeous."

Sam feels as if this is an understatement, but he doesn't say anything about that. "But you—you love Rachel, don't you?"

Grinning, Puck reaches out and punches Sam lightly on the shoulder. "Yeah, I do," he says easily. "But even if I didn't, I wouldn't go after your girl. I'm not like that anymore."

"I know."

There's that crunch of gravel again, and this time, Sam spots the flash of sun along chrome in between the branches. He's on his feet before he remembers that Puck is even there, and he's out on the driveway first.

He sees Quinn smile at him through the windshield, and his own smile stretches across his face instinctively. He opens the passenger door for her—her car, her poor Beetle that she loved, was completely totaled in the accident—and reaches down to pull her into his arms.

Her throaty chuckle is in his ear as she notches her chin over his shoulder. "Hi, baby."

"Hi."

Sam turns his face so that he can kiss the top of her head, and he feels her smile against his neck. He spots Rachel over her shoulder, and feels heat creep across his cheeks again. "Uh—hi, Rach."

She giggles. "Hi, Sam."

Rachel tugs gently, playfully, on Quinn's skirt. "If you can detach yourself from Sammy, we have to get the groceries inside."

As she's walking toward the house, a brown paper bag in her arms, Puck swoops out of the garage like a hawk and picks her up, swinging her around, which makes her shriek with laughter. "No-_ah!"_

Quinn pulls away, sliding her hands along his ribs, sending bolts of heat through the pit of his stomach. They've been together again for about seven months now, ever since Sam transferred back to McKinley, but the way each touch electrifies him hasn't faded at all.

She stands up on her tiptoes for a kiss. Sam's instincts, not to mention his hormones, beg him to snag her by the hips and kiss her back until she's clinging to him, but then she strokes his cheek, and he softens, melts.

"I love you," she says, and still, after seven months, he doesn't quite believe that he's heard her right.

"I love you, too."

He helps her carry the rest of the groceries into the house, trying to discern the contents of the bag in his arms. "What's this stuff?"

Quinn elbows him. "No peeking! Rachel wants it to be a surprise."

"Is it vegan?" Sam asks, wrinkling his nose, and Quinn laughs.

"Not entirely. She's trying to convert Puck, but she knows you and I are carnivores through and through," she assures him, lips curling back over her teeth in a mock snarl.

From the kitchen, Puck interjects, "I am _not _eating vegan!"

"Oh, Noah…please? Just try?"

The corners of Sam's lips work upward at the look on Puck's face, a stricken mixture of a desire to make Rachel happy and an intense fear of vegan food. He sets the bag on the counter and claps Puck on the back.

"Come on, dude," he teases. "It can't be that bad."

Puck just stares at him. Behind him, Sam can hear the muffled sound of Quinn's laughter, and he turns to see her with her face partially buried in the groceries that she's helping Rachel unpack, her eyes scrunched up.

"Noah," Rachel says again, moving to grab onto his arm and peering hopefully up into his face. "Won't you at least try? Please? For me?"

He sighs, defeated. "I'll _try. _One piece."

Rachel claps.

/

Later, when they've finished eating and Rachel assigns herself clean-up duty, Puck gives Sam a prodding look.

"Why don't we help?" Sam asks Quinn, and she follows him into the kitchen with a little shrug of acquiescence.

They form an assembly line—Sam scrapes the remaining scraps of food into the trash, handing the dishes to Rachel for washing, while Quinn dries. The girls' voices weave into a pleasant rope of sound that pulls Sam into his own thoughts, while their words flutter around him like birds.

"…dorm…"

"…I'm worried about…"

"…don't, they'll love…"

"…but what…"

"…single?" Quinn says, and Sam's head snaps up, his heart in his throat.

"I thought about that," Rachel's responding, "but I thought it would be a more meaningful college experience if I had a roommate."

Sam relaxes, and as their conversation falls into a lull, he finds his opportunity. "Hey, girls?"

They look at him, Quinn's hands still tangled up in a dishtowel. "What?" she says.

"Well, I—Puck and I were talking earlier, and we thought—since you're going to be so far away next year—" He pauses, working through a pang of distress at the thought. "—we thought you'd like to go on a road trip. The four of us. Some time together before you go?"

Well, no one is going to accuse him of being an easy salesman, but he hopes the way he's looking at Quinn, employing what she refers to as his "kicked puppy" face—wide, pleading eyes and a downturned, pouty mouth—will be sufficient. Rachel reaches for him.

"Oh my God," she says. "What is that? What is that face?"

Quinn sighs, but Sam can see a smile fighting to pull up the corners of her mouth. "It's a face that means we're going on a road trip," she says.

From the living room, Puck whoops.


	2. Chapter 2

[Lima, Ohio]

**Quinn**

"Don't go," Sam says, winding locks of her hair around the fingers of one hand as he kisses her neck. "Please, Quinn."

She blinks at him, his words pulling her out of the pleasant haze that his touch always pulled her into. "On the road trip?"

He looks up at her, doe-eyed. "No."

Quinn sighs and rubs the small of his back, bobbing her head up to brush her lips across his forehead. "Sam, it won't be that bad."

His right palm rests gently on her ribcage, which is as low as he'll go without her permission. The way he looks up at her, even when his lips are swollen and his gaze feverish, to silently ask her if he can move his hands, makes her love him and want him in equal measure.

"Won't you miss me?" he asks plaintively.

"Of course I will."

"Connecticut and Ohio are over 518 miles apart."

Her eyebrows almost connect with her hairline. "How do you know that?"

Sam ducks his face away from her and mumbles, "I Googled."

"Sam," Quinn says firmly. "Look at me."

When he does, he has that kicked puppy look on his face again, except this time, she knows it's genuine. She reaches up and cradles his face between her hands, kissing him lightly. "Do you love me?"

He gives her this look, his eyebrows drawing together in complete mystification, as though she has asked him whether or not grass is green or if water is wet. "Yes," he says. "You know I do, Quinn. Why would you—?"

She puts a finger to his lips, and he stops talking. "Why?"

Now Sam appears not only confused, but concerned for her sanity. "You're perfect," he tells her, as if this should be completely obvious. "You're—you're the smartest person I've ever met, you have a great sense of humor, you're kind, you're compassionate, you're just—you're the best."

He gives her that half smile, the one that makes a dimple appear in his left cheek and his eyes crinkle at the corners. "Not to mention, you're ridiculously beautiful."

She is momentarily distracted by the fact that her beauty was last on the list and her intelligence was first. _This, _she thinks, _is why I love you._

"And is any of that," she continues, regaining her voice, "going to change when I'm in New Haven? Are your feelings going to change?"

"No," Sam responds, with the stout certainty that he usually reserves for debates about which captain of the Enterprise is the best.

"Not even a little?"

"No."

"Not even a teensy, tiny bit?"

"Not even."

"So," Quinn drawls, fingertips drawing light circles across his cheekbone, "you'll love me, even when I'm at Yale. And I'll love you, even when you're still at McKinley…I think that means we're going to be okay."

He sighs and drops his head onto her chest, snuggling close so that he fits under her chin. "I know," he says, his voice muffled. "I just don't want you to leave me."

Quinn's mouth quivers without her permission, and she bites her lip hard to stop the tears that are beginning to line her throat. Except for her mother, Sam will be the hardest person for her to leave behind.

As much as she loves her glee club family, as unexpected and as deep as some of these friendships are, Sam is the one who got under her skin the most, in the best way. At first, it was more like a fever, creeping through her veins and frightening her with the scorching heat, and Sam was the only thing that even resembled a cure.

And then it was an infusion of strength, which Quinn knows she doesn't lack on her own, but this was different. Quinn's strength was steel and ferocity, a harsh snarl and a flash of claws. Sam's strength was in his gentleness, his generosity, and she never knew this could be a part of being strong, as well.

Now, she doesn't know how to function properly without him. If this had been anyone else, any other boy, this would have terrified her, made her feel weak, as if her feelings were a crutch. But it's Sam, with his smile that spreads slowly across his face and reaches his eyes before it's all the way across his mouth; who looks at her when he's laughing to make sure she's laughing, too; who will wrap his fingers around her wrist, as if to ascertain by the solidity of her arm and the warmth of her skin that she is real.

"I don't want to leave you, either," she says quietly, combing her fingers through his hair as much to comfort herself as to comfort him. "But we have this trip, and the rest of the summer…it's going to be fine."

He sighs, and she feels his breath fluting across her skin. "I know," he says, but his tone suggests that he doesn't really feel any better.

Quinn presses her face into his hair, inhaling the lingering scent of lemons that seems permanently woven into his scalp, along with the clean, simple scent of the shampoo he uses. When he goes home in a few hours, the pillowcase they're resting on will smell like this, and she loves that.

Her bed is slowly becoming _their _bed—his scent clings to the linens, she sometimes finds articles of clothing tangled with the top sheet, and this is where they spend most of their time when he comes over. They haven't had sex yet, but now it's less of her saying _no _and more of her saying _not yet._

He's kissing her neck again, light, absent kisses that gentle and affectionate. Quinn hums quietly in pleasure, letting her head fall back, and he moves up her throat, his lips ghosting over her jaw.

"Mmm…Sam…"

His smile is a brand against her skin as he moves down to her collarbone with a light scraping of teeth. "I love when you say my name."

Quinn feels herself melting beneath him, every sensation dissolving—the mattress beneath her, the texture of her bedspread, even her own heartbeat—except for the feeling of Sam, his weight and his warmth and his touch. She runs her hands through his hair, oddly intoxicated by the softness of it, by the way the light catches on the strands.

He looks up at her, and he's still smiling, and honestly it almost feels like someone is punching Quinn in the stomach, because he's so beautiful and the way he looks at her honestly isn't fair—it's as if she's set up the sun and the stars and the moon, and lit the match that set them all burning.

"Do you want to know where we're going?" he asks. "On the road trip, I mean."

"Yes."

Sam grins. "Well, you'll have to wait. It's a surprise."

She shoves him off the bed, which only makes him laugh, and then he pulls her down on top of him.

/

They spend about twenty more minutes than they need to kissing against his car, because they find it difficult to part. She gently shoves on his chest after a while, hoping he can't feel that her hands are trembling just a little bit.

"You should go," she says, and laughs when he pouts playfully. "I'll see you tomorrow. What's the plan again?"

Sam thinks for a minute, and then says, "Rachel drives over to Puck's, I pick you up and bring you over there, and then we all leave in her car."

"And go…where?"

"I told you, it's a surprise."

She frowns.

"No, don't do that. That's not fair."

The frown deepens.

"Quinn…"

It borders on tragic.

"Come on, don't do that…"

It becomes completely tragic.

"Southern California!"

Her anguished expression is replaced by a wide, sunny smile. "Thank you."

He scowls at her, except it looks dangerously on the verge of a grin. "Puck is going to kill me."

Quinn kisses him. "I won't let him touch you, baby, I promise."


	3. Chapter 3

[Lima, Ohio]

**Puck**

He sits sandwiched between Leroy and Hiram, waiting for Rachel to finish packing. Usually, even the word "parents" makes him feel like hives are breaking out over his skin, but he likes the Berry dads. Maybe it's because they just see him as someone who makes their daughter happy and overlook his "bad boy" image, or maybe it's just because they remind him of Rachel.

"Snickerdoodle, Noah?" prompts Leroy, nudging the plate toward Puck. "Rachel always goes on a bit of a baking frenzy before she leaves us for any extended period of time."

"Um, sure," Puck says, despite the fact that he isn't 100% what a Snickerdoodle is. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Leroy says, and his smile is so like Rachel's that Puck smiles in response without really thinking of it.

There is a series of thumping sounds from the stairs, and then she appears in the living room doorway, dragging a rolling suitcase that almost as tall as she is behind her. Puck stands and crosses the room in two strides, easily lifting the case with one hand and pulling her in for a quick kiss with the other.

"Noah," she mumbles against his lips. "My dads…"

He lifts his head, keeping his gaze trained on hers. "Sorry, babe. I can't help myself."

Puck carries her suitcase out to her car as she says good-bye to her fathers. They trail after her as she comes down the driveway, fishing her keys out of her purse. They're both speaking at the same time, their voices chasing each other like dogs after their tails.

"Be careful on the highway—"

"I know, Dad. I will."

"—and don't pick up any strangers—"

"No hitchhikers. Got it."

"—be sure you always have enough gas—"

"I will, Daddy."

"—stay in nice motels—"

"I intend to stay in the Four Seasons."

Puck tries to mask a laugh with a cough, but he thinks Rachel notices anyway. She winks at him.

She hugs them both good-bye, and then he is surprised when he feels Hiram's hand on his shoulder, turning him around. Hiram clasps Puck's hands warmly between his. "Stay safe, all right, son?" he says. "And keep our little girl out of trouble."

"Will do," Puck manages, surprised because Hiram genuinely seems to care about his safety and seems to trust him with Rachel's, which is vastly more important.

Rachel kisses each of her fathers on the cheek one last time, and then she and Puck duck into her car. He cranes his neck to see them both waving good-bye, and he automatically raises a hand in response. He offers them a thumbs-up sign, which seems incredibly dorky even in the seconds before he does it, but they smile at him and copy the gesture.

As they drive, he studies the map he printed off from MapQuest that delineates their route from Lima to L.A.

He told Sam to keep it a secret, but he's sure Quinn has gotten it out of him by now—that girl could ask Sam to chop off his left nut, and he'd do it, although Puck can't really fault him for this. He knows there is pretty much nothing he wouldn't do for Rachel, even before they were dating. He still has flashbacks from the production and screening of "Run, Joey, Run" to prove this.

He's watching her out of the corner of his eye, and so he notices when her fingers begin to uncurl from the steering wheel. Puck reaches out and snaps on the radio before she has to let go of the wheel completely. Rachel smiles.

"Thank you."

At a stoplight, he leans over and kisses her cheek. "I don't want you to be distracted," he says.

Her smile heats up, becomes seductive. "Not even by you?"

"Not even by me," he answers, and his seriousness draws her gaze to him. "I don't want any accidents."

Rachel's smile wilts and she looks away from him, her throat working. He covers one of her hands with his own with a gentle squeeze. "Rachel," he says, and waits until she is looking at him again. "It wasn't your fault."

Her teeth snag her lower lip and she murmurs, "My wedding."

"Yeah, your wedding, but—"

"I was texting her, Noah! If she'd been paying attention to the road…"

"You don't know that," he points out gently. "A lot of us were texting her. I was. I know Sam was. And we don't even know if that's what happened. That guy probably took the turn too fast or something."

The light turns green, and they spend the rest of the ride to Puck's house in silence. He takes her hand as they go up the walkway, and she threads her fingers through his. He tugs her to a stop. "Hey, Rach?"

"Yeah?"

"Love you."

She smiles at their feet, but it's a smile nonetheless. "I love you, too."

Behind them, Sam's car pulls into the drive, and Quinn waves to them through the windshield. She has a backpack on her lap, which she swings onto her shoulder as she steps out. Sam ducks toward the trunk to pull out their luggage.

"What's that?" Puck asks, sliding his arm around Rachel's waist and pulling her against him, feeling warmth spread through his stomach at the way her head fits so neatly beneath his chin.

Quinn jiggles the bag. "Swimsuits for me and Rachel," she says, and Rachel makes grabby hands toward the bag. "For the beach."

"The beach?" Rachel echoes, lifting her nose out of the backpack and blinking at Puck. "Is that where we're going?"

"Well, I'm sure we'll hit it at some point while we're in L.A.," Quinn answers, her lips twitching violently at the exasperation on Puck's face.

"L.A.!" gasps Rachel. "Oh, Noah! That's going to be so much fun!"

Puck runs his hand over his Mohawk. "Evans, come on…"

The top half of Sam's red face appears over the raised trunk of the car. "Sorry. Quinn used the pouty face on me."

He sighs, trying to pretend that he's surprised or even irritated. Sam smiles sheepishly at him, and Rachel giggles in Puck's ear. "Don't be mad, baby," she says. "Now I can try on this little red bikini Quinn bought me…"

Puck shakes Sam's vigorously, to a chorus of laughter from the girls. "Let's hit the road."


	4. Chapter 4

[Cincinnati, Ohio]

**Rachel**

As they cruise through the city, looking for a hotel that doesn't scream "Norman Bates works here", Rachel is the only one who is still awake, and oddly she doesn't mind.

Usually, it's hard—if not impossible—for her to sit in complete silence. If she's alone, she's either asleep or listening to music, and if she's with people, especially people she cares about as much as these three, there needs to be conversation or she'll feel like exploding.

But now, it's peaceful, with the lights of Cincinnati sliding gently across the hood of her car, illuminating Noah's sleeping face. In the backseat, Quinn is curled up with her head resting in Sam's lap, cradled protectively in his hands as his own head lolls against the window. Occasionally, Quinn will shift in her sleep, murmuring, and Sam's lips will twitch as if in response.

Rachel can barely believe this is happening to her. Judging from the books and movies she devoured as a young girl, high school was always supposed to be a period of transition, a coming of age, but she always thought it would simply be a blooming of her talent and her status as a heart-wrenching ingénue.

She didn't expect to be friends with Quinn Fabray of all people, but she meant it when she told her that their friendship is what she prizes most from four years of high school. And now she's so used to and so fond of Sam's goofy smile and his Avatar references that she can't imagine not knowing him.

Noah Puckerman is the one surprise that she keeps expecting to disappear, and the one that it would hurt her the most to lose. It was shocking enough, precious enough, when he not only stop throwing Slushees in her face, but began to actually smile at her.

She viscerally remembers the day Coach Tenaka laid down the ban against glee club, which meant that if any of the football players chose Glee, it would mean losing football. The feeling in her chest, her heart fluttering like an excited bird, when she saw Noah—without his football uniform, his stance clearly set—was something that has never really gone away.

Rachel suspects this is when she fell in love with him, although it would be a shamefully long time before she admitted it to anyone, even herself.

She pulls into the parking lot of a hotel that at least has all the letters on its sign lit, and is deliberating about whom to wake up first when she realizes that Sam is already awake.

"Hey," she says quietly. "Nice nap?"

Sam wrinkles his nose up, laughing silently. "I can't feel my left leg," he says. "Quinn's elbow has been digging into it for the last hour and a half."

At this, Quinn stirs fully, her eyelashes—incredibly, naturally long eyelashes that is just one of the things Rachel envies about her—fluttering against her cheeks, and sits up. Sam's attention is immediately diverted, and Rachel sits back to nudge Noah.

"Mhmmph?" he slurs.

There is giggling from the backseat, tenor and alto.

"Wake up, sleepy head," Rachel says. "We're at the hotel."

He rubs the sleep from his eyes, looking sweet and childlike even in the stringent neon light of the hotel sign. "Um," he says. "Okay."

The four of them climb out of the car, stretching their arms above their heads and working kinks out of their necks. Quinn is trying to rub the impression of the seam in Sam's jeans out of her cheek to no avail.

She's laughing at this when she feels Puck's hands on her hips, drawing her toward him so that her back is pressed against his chest. He notches his chin over her shoulder, turning his head so that his lips meet her ear.

"I dreamed about you," he murmurs, his breath warm and smelling strongly of the peppermint gum he chews. "It was nice."

A pleasant shiver races down Rachel's spine and jumps up again, zinging across her scalp. She snuggles back into him, leaning her head back. "Oh, yeah? What was it?"

"You were on stage," he says, in a tone that implies there is an _obviously _after these words. "And you were singing Defying Gravity, totally knocking out of the park, as usual. When you were done, I came up on stage with this huge bouquet of roses, and I kissed you, and you told the whole crowd, 'This is my boyfriend, Noah.' And you seemed so…proud."

The surprise in his voice makes her heart hurt, and she turns in his arms to stroke his cheek. "Of course I'd be proud," she says. "I _am _proud."

Teasing, from across the parking lot, Quinn calls, "Are you guys coming in or are you just going to sleep in the car?"

Puck grins wolfishly over the top of Rachel's head and says, "Why, do you and Sammy want some privacy?"

Sam's blush is evident even in the faded light of night.

/

They end up taking adjoining rooms, and Rachel can hear the trilling sound of Quinn's laughter and Sam saying, "Get back here, Fabray!" followed by a shriek and Sam's triumphant shout.

She and Puck are reclining on the bed, her head pillowed on his chest. Puck's hands stroke up and down her arm, eliciting sweet little chills that race across her skin like dragonflies over water. She tucks her face into his neck, inhaling the cinnamon-laced scent of him.

"Noah?" she murmurs, already half-asleep, and he hums to let her know he's listening. "Can you believe I was with Finn?"

His hand stills on her arm, which raises her from the shores of sleep as surely as a fisherman reels in a fish, and she sits up. He follows her, bracing his back against the headboard. His expression is unexpectedly and horribly bleak.

"Yeah, I can," he says quietly, his eyes looking just to the left of her face. "I was waiting for you, every day, waiting for you to see that you were so much better than this guy, and—"

He stops talking, and his mouth shuts so fast that there is an audible click as his teeth snap together. Rachel looks down, eyes finding a loose thread in the blanket and fingers seeking it, pulling at it.

"And I thought you never would," he continues. "I thought I had missed my chance."

"But you didn't," Rachel says, her eyes flying up to his face, her sudden ferocity surprising even her. "I know it took—it took way too long for me to see it, but you're the one for me, Noah, you _are, _and—"

His mouth is on hers, shutting her up, and for the first time in her life, she doesn't mind. Puck pulls away, his eyes bright.

"I know," he says softly, his lips still brushing against hers. "I know, babe."

Rachel smiles, tracing his jaw with her fingertips, and chuckles when he closes her eyes and nuzzles into her hand like a cat; she almost expects him to purr.

One wouldn't think that she would feel so safe, so at home, with Noah Puckerman, the infamous bad boy of McKinley High, but then, she's always known that he was more than that. Even when he still threw people into Dumpsters and referred to himself as a "sex shark", she knew.

She kisses the tip of his nose. "Let's go to bed," she says. "We have a long drive tomorrow."

They curl up together, his arms winding around her waist, and she falls asleep with Noah's soft, wheezing snore in her ear.


	5. Chapter 5

[Cincinnati, Ohio]

**Sam**

He wakes up first, with Quinn tucked against his side and the sun just beginning to weave golden threads into the shadows of the room. Her hair is mussed and blending with his on the pillow, and she isn't exactly snoring, but there is this endearing little whistling noise issuing from between her slightly parted lips.

Sometimes, he is floored by how much he loves her, and this is one of those times. It's the simplicity of the moment, the warm weight of her pressed against him, the fact that there is something so trusting about the way she's sleeping so deeply in his arms.

And—not that this would change his feelings if the opposite was true—it doesn't hurt that she's wearing nothing but a bra and a pair of his own sweatpants.

Last night, as he'd been changing for bed, she'd yanked his shirt right off his head as he was shrugging into it.

"Hey!"

She laughed, darting across the room for the ostensible safety of the bathroom, and he'd shouted, "Get back here, Fabray!" and took two steps that caught him up to her easily and grabbed her around the waist, depositing her on the bed. His shirt was pinned beneath her body, and she was laughing, and even though he pretended to be mad, he didn't resist when she pulled him down for a kiss.

"If I keep your shirt," she said, after they had been kissing long enough for Sam to become lightheaded from lack of air, "I'll lose mine."

"Deal," he panted, thinking she was joking, and so couldn't help himself when she sat up and actually removed her blouse, revealing a red lacy bra that stood out against her creamy skin in a way that reminded him of rose petals scattered across crisp white sheets.

He'd averted his eyes, not because this wasn't something he wanted to see—God, if anything, he wanted to see more—but because it was entirely possible this was going to make him come in his pants, and he was not going to do that right in front of her.

And then he felt her soft hands, her long, elegant fingers, wrapping around his chin and tilting his face back to hers and they were kissing again, and it wasn't long before Sam's hips were moving of their own accord, and what made it worse is that he wasn't the only one who was making pleading, desperate little noises.

"I want you so _much, _Quinn," he whined, and then he had needed to roll off of her and make a run for the bathroom and bite down on the sleeve of his free hand to keep himself from shouting when he got himself off.

Now, he caresses her cheek as delicately as he can, but her eyes flutter open anyway. It reminds him of the scene in _Sleeping Beauty, _when true love's kiss wakes the princess up, and the first thing Aurora does is smile at Phillip.

"Hey, gorgeous," he says, and she turns her face into the pillow to hide her pink cheeks.

After a few minutes, she peeks up at him and mumbles, "Sorry about last night. I know it must be frustrating that I don't—that we haven't—"

Sam shakes his head. "Don't."

"But I'm—"

"I know. Don't."

He slides his hands up and down her back until she relaxes, her body softening and molding against his. Sam closes his eyes. This pleasure is enough for now.

"I don't mind waiting for you, Quinn," he says, pressing his lips to her hair. "I mean, I wouldn't try to protect my virtue—"

She laughs, and he smiles.

"—if you said you were ready right now, or if you'd been ready last night. I told you once that I'd never pressure you to do more than kiss, and that's still true. I'll wait for years if I have to, as long as it means I get to keep you."

Quinn presses her face against his shoulder, and the feeling of her luscious mouth against his bare skin is already teasing the limits of his composure, which is stressed even further when she looks up at him and says, "It won't be years. Trust me."

"Um—" Sam tries, and has to clear his throat a few times before he can actually speak. "So, like, are we talking—like, months, or—?"

"Probably not that long, either."

He has to sit up because he is afraid that he'll choke on the saliva flooding his mouth like the drummer for Led Zeppelin choked on his own vomit. "You—so—you don't think—you're not saying—?"

There is a knock on the door that connects their room with Puck's and Rachel's, and Quinn calls out in a deceptively calm, clear voice, "Come in."

She's shrugging into a fresh dress by the time Rachel's face appears in the open doorway. "Good morning," she says brightly. "We're about ready to head out."

"Okay," Quinn answers, and Sam thinks he's the only one to notice that her hands are trembling slightly.

He reaches over and takes her wrist, rubbing his thumb gently over the delicate skin at the heel of her palm. "Soon?"

"Soon."

Even though his first impulse is to jump up and down like an excited child, he cups her cheek with his free hand and waits until she meets his eyes. "Are you sure? I want you to be sure, Quinn."

The way she smiles at him is almost unfair, and he thinks that this is another one of those moments where he loves her so much that he honestly is stunned by it. She layers her hand over his and nods. "I'm sure."

She steps away from him toward the bathroom, and then looks over her shoulder, a completely devious smirk on her lips. "You aren't the only one, you know."

Since he's in the middle of getting dressed when she speaks, in the process of pulling on his faded Spiderman t-shirt, Sam's response is absent-minded. "Aren't the only one what, babe?"

"Who had to get themselves off in the hotel bathroom last night."

In his haste to look at her, Sam tries to put his arm through the collar and his head through the sleeve of his shirt, and is subsequently stuck until Puck comes into the room to look for them.

/

It's Puck's turn to drive, which means there is a lot of language which Sam believes shouldn't be used in front of two ladies, and it also means that he and Quinn are getting flung around the backseat despite the fact that they both have their seatbelts on.

"Did he just curse in Hebrew? Isn't that sacrilegious?" Quinn grumbles, clasping a hand to her forehead at the spot where it's rapped against the window.

"Yes," Rachel says from the passenger seat, her teeth worrying at her fingernails. "I think it is. You're certainly not supposed to take God's name in vain like that."

When a red Mazda cuts them off, Puck responds with a singular hand gesture and an implication as to his relationship with the driver's mother. Quinn raises her eyebrows and mutters, "You know, I wouldn't be entirely surprised if he was right."

"Shut it, Fabray," Puck retorts, but with the half-hearted hostility of a sibling. "How do you know I haven't made it with _your _mom?"

"Ugh! Maybe my mother has taste?"

"Well, clearly not, if she slept with your dad."

At this, the car becomes very quiet, and Sam can hear the sharp intake of breath that Quinn makes. She looks down into her lap, sliding away from Sam ever so slightly as though to avoid tainting him.

They've talked about the differences between their home lives before—how Sam grew up with so much love that he never doubted his place, but with just as little money; how Quinn always felt marginalized in her own home, an object more than a person, although she never had to worry about how her dad would pay the rent or the electric bill.

"I know your life hasn't been easy," she told him once, "but the only thing stopping me from wishing I could switch places with you is knowing that you'd have to live in my house."

"Your mom loves you so much, Quinn," Sam said tentatively, and she'd nodded, smiled.

"I know," she said. "She and I are so close—now. But she didn't…she didn't fight for me, like I felt a mother should have. She just let him…and she knew. I think that's the worst part. She _knew, _and she could probably tell I was scared, that I felt so alone, and she did nothing."

She'd looked at him then, her smile crooked and her eyes shining too brightly. "I've forgiven her for that," she said. "Or, at least, I've started to. I just…I just want parents like yours, parents that love each other, parents that—that love you. That _show _it. I—you try to hide it, but I know you're embarrassed for me to see your house, but…God, Sam, at least it's a home."

Puck pulls over to the shoulder of the road and half-climbs into the backseat, the heel of his shoe catching against the horn and making it honk. "Hey, Q," he says, his voice tinged with desperation. "Q, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have—!"

"It's okay," she says, and when she lifts her face, she's smiling—a faint, weak smile, but a smile just the same. "I mean, you're right. He isn't—he isn't a good person."

It strikes Sam now that he's never heard her refer to Russell Fabray as anyone other than 'him' or 'he', a cold, clinical pronoun. She's never called him "Dad" or even the remote "my father".

But maybe this is for the best, because someone who could turn Quinn away in a time of need, of fear and desperation, doesn't deserve a daughter like her, anyway.

And suddenly, Rachel and Puck are piled in the backseat, and the three of them are hugging Quinn, and she's laughing, really laughing.

In the middle of this huddle, Sam presses his lips to the soft skin just beneath her jaw. Rachel's arm is pressed against his chest, her legs thrown over his lap, and Puck sort of encompasses them all.

Not for the first time, he thinks that this family, the family built from misfits and lonely children, from Cheerios and Avatar nerds (well, nerd), is the best one any of them could have asked for.


	6. Chapter 6

[Cincinnati, Ohio/Goodland, Indiana]

**Quinn**

It's strange to Quinn, how she's fallen in love with the strangest and smallest aspects of Sam, both in the physical and emotional sense.

She likes to walk slightly behind him, not enough that she has to let go of his hand, but enough so she can see the back of his head. She's oddly fond of the nape of his neck, the way it broadens into his lovely shoulders. She likes the way the material of his t-shirt will cling to his back, how it highlights the fluidity of his motions.

She is particularly enamored with his hands, the breadth of his palms, and the length of his guitarist's fingers. Quinn loves the paradox of them, how they are large enough to easily hurt her, to bruise, but they are never anything but soft.

And then there are several habits of his that she isn't even sure Sam is aware of, little things like the way he'll mess up his hair when he's nervous, or how he'll run his tongue over his lower lip after applying chapstick.

What she loves most, though, is watching him play guitar—the myriad of expressions that flicker over his face, from concentration to a joy so complete that it almost seems invasive of her to be there; the way those fingers of his move over the strings; the way his hair will fall into his eyes as he lowers his head. He almost appears shy when he plays, bordering on childlike, his natural sweetness transitioning into a sort of simple peace.

It's his turn to drive today, and they cross the border from Ohio into Indiana at around 4:30 that afternoon. As they pass a sign for the town of Goodland, Sam's stomach growls audibly.

Quinn sighs, fighting back a smile, caught between amusement and exasperation. "How long have you been hungry?"

"A while," he admits, ducking his head like a puppy expecting the newspaper across its snout. "I just didn't want to bug anybody…"

"Dude," Puck says from the backseat, which is commentary enough.

Sam pulls into the parking lot of the first diner they see, and Rachel huffs about how it doesn't look like a place that has many vegan options. While Puck is rubbing her back and promising her a totally choice PB&J, Sam offers Quinn his arm.

"May I escort you into this fine establishment, my lady?" he asks, and she laughs, tucking her hand into the crook of his arm.

"Of course, good sir."

As they walk, Quinn stretches up on her tiptoes to place her lips by Sam's ear. "You didn't happen to bring your guitar with you, did you?"

He looks at her, eyebrows canting upward in surprise. "I did, actually. Why?"

Pleased, Quinn tucks her head against his shoulder as they walk. "You should play for me tonight," she says. "If you don't mind."

"I never mind playing for you, Quinn," he responds, and she can hear the smile in his voice, which pulls up the corners of her own mouth. "I never mind doing anything for you."

He says it so casually, so simply, but her heart still jumps in her chest nonetheless. The warm solidity of his body glows in her consciousness like a lighthouse, steering her from the rocky shores that others had sent her crashing into time and time again with the force of a maelstrom.

This is the thing that scares her most about Sam—how much her loves her, how raw yet complete it is. Most teenage boys boast easily about how they would do anything for their girlfriends, but Sam _means _it. And he asks nothing from her in return, does not expect her to love him as much.

Once, after they were back together, he said, "I'm just happy you love me at all."

Thinking about this, Quinn pecks his cheek. He smiles down at her, and she swears to God, as cliché as this sounds, her heart actually feels like it's melting.

"You're the love of my life," she says, unconsciously tightening her fingers on his arm, and he stops walking to look at her. "I just—I want all of you, always."

This admission is completely out of character for her. It should feel like an out-of-body experience, as if someone has stolen her voice, is moving her lips without her permission. But instead, it just feels right, because it's true.

He twists his body so that he can wrap both arms around her waist, drawing her against him. "I feel the exact same way about you," he says, his mouth working up into that damn half smile of his. "I love everything about you, and there's never going to be a time in my life when I don't."

They aren't able to enjoy their kiss for long when Puck hoots like a spectator at a sporting event. She feels Sam's lips quirk with amusement beneath hers, and when she attempts to shoot a glare in Puck's direction, it falls flat.

"Enjoying the show, Puckerman?" she asks, winding her arms around Sam's neck. "Take a video, you'll be able to post it on the Internet."

Rachel, her hand wrapped around Puck's, laughs. "It's cute!" she insists. "You guys are so cute."

"We are," Sam agrees proudly. "We're adorable."

Quinn buries her face against Sam's chest to hide it when twin spots of bright pink bloom on her cheeks.

/

When he brings out his guitar later, she has to restrain herself from clapping her hands together in a surge of giddiness. He grins at her, half-settling on the bed with one foot braced against the floor, strumming experimentally at a few chords.

"Any requests?" he asks.

She chews on her lip, thoughtful, and when she names the song—a recent favorite of hers, one that reminds them both of the other—Sam smiles and dips his head. "Coming right up."

Quinn stretches out on her back, eyes closed as if he's singing her a lullaby. Her lips trace the words as Sam sings them; she loves his voice, loves the slight rasp, the barest hint of a Southern twang interspersed among the vowels and consonants. It reminds her of sunlit meadows, sweet green grass swaying in a gentle breeze, the picnic they went on—the first time she told him she loved him.

This song came on the radio on the ride home, and Sam smiled, touched her hand without speaking as he sang along. It was enough.

_There's more here than what we're seeing, a divine conspiracy—that you, an angel lovely, could somehow fall for me. You'll always be love's great martyr, and I'll be the flattered fool, and I need you._

She doesn't realize she's actually fallen asleep until her eyes open again, and the lamp is off, Sam curled up beside her with his head resting on her stomach. If she cranes her neck, she can make out a sliver of his face, spotlighted by the moon.

God, he's so sweet, so beautiful. She runs her fingers through his hair, and in his sleep, he snuggles closer to her, arms cinching tightly around her waist and cheek firmly pressed against her ribs. It occurs to her that her shoes are already off, that they're under the blanket, that Sam must have done all this so gently that she didn't even begin to wake up.

He mumbles, starts to lift his head, and she brushes his hair back off his forehead, soothing. "Go back to sleep," she says. "Go back to sleep, Sam."

His gaze rolls toward her. He is still half-asleep and sinking fast. "Let's get married," he murmurs. "I want you to be my wife."

Quinn smiles. "Okay."

"Okay," he repeats.

A few minutes later, they're both asleep again, and Quinn's dreams are full of long white skirts and violets in bouquets.


	7. Chapter 7

[Goodland, Indiana/Hopedale, Illinois]

**Puck**

He wakes up at two in the morning, drenched in glacial sweat that soaks his clothes and dampens the sheets beneath him, the blanket partially wrapped around Rachel and partially tangled around his feet.

Today is Quinn's turn to drive, and he knows it won't be like—that. She won't have her cell phone out, she'll be paying attention, and God knows she would roll down an embankment of razors into a lake of fire before letting any harm come to Sam. He knows it is more than likely that they'll make it today, and the rest of her driving days, without a single scratch to any of them.

He is afraid for her, of course, the girl with whom he has been through so much, and for Sam, who honestly always sort of liked, and who has been his best friend ever since their girlfriends became inseparable. But more than either of them, Puck is terrified for Rachel.

Turning his head on the pillow, he watches her sleep, which normally he would find Twilight-level creepy and never, ever do, but right now, he just needs the comfort of her face. He thinks about the week in junior year, when idiot Hudson smashed his freakishly huge hand into her nose, when she was seriously considering getting a nose job so she would look more like Quinn.

As completely un-macho as this sounds, and he'd never actually use this phrase in front of anyone, it absolutely broke his heart to see her like that. Quinn is beautiful, of course, strikingly so. And to be honest, yeah, Puck loved her once—loves her still, in a friendship way.

But Rachel has the sort of beauty that sneaks up on you, that certainly snuck up on him. You notice how nice her hair is one day, how lovely her lips are the next. And then you see the light behind those huge brown eyes, and that's what captivates you; the way it ignites the fuse of her smile, bubbles up in her laugh. She captivates you in pieces, but that doesn't make you any less caught.

In the adjoining room, he can hear the faint sound of Sam's voice, and it takes him a moment before he realizes that Sam is saying, "No, _no!_"

Stricken, he's on his feet in a second and through the door connecting their rooms. While his heart is pounding so hard that he can hear it and adrenaline blurs his vision, Puck slowly realizes that Quinn is safe and fast asleep, and Sam is in the grips of a nightmare so severe that his body appears mummified, twisted up in the sheets.

"Sam," Puck hisses, dropping to his knees at the other dude's side and shaking his shoulder. "_Sam._"

He wrenches out of Puck's hold, bolt upright in the bed, his breath coming in ragged bursts that almost sound like sobs. Beside him, Quinn's eyebrows draw together and she slurs something that sounds like, "What is it?"

Even though he's still gasping for air, his face still twisted, Sam reaches out and rubs her shoulder in small, soothing circles. "Go back to sleep, baby," he says. "It's okay, everything is fine. Go back to sleep."

When Quinn has drifted off again, Puck gestures silently at the door that leads to the breezeway running in front of the motel, and Sam nods. He waits for Sam to pull on a pair of jeans before they both slip outside.

The night is pleasant, warm without being stifling. The sky is studded with stars that remind Puck of Rachel's desire to Bedazzle something of his before she goes, and there is a soft breeze that toys with Sam's hair and plays along the hem of Puck's t-shirt.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asks.

Sam's expression is uncharacteristically bleak, remote, as if he is a thousand miles away from Puck. "No."

"Okay."

They walk back and forth in front of the motel for a while in silence. After a few minutes, Sam stops, and Puck follows suit.

"Can I ask you something?" Sam says, and Puck nods. "Have you and Rachel…uh—?"

"No," Puck answers, and laughs when Sam's eyebrows shoot upward in surprise. "What?"

"I just thought that you guys would have by now, that's all. I mean, it's not a big deal or anything, obviously. Quinn and I haven't, either," Sam says, the words coming out very fast, as if he is in a rush to get them out of his mouth before Puck sinks his fist into it.

Puck laughs again. "It's okay," he says. "We've talked about it, and she's just not ready to sleep together yet."

What pisses him off sometimes is how some people refuse to believe that he's changed—they still expect to see the idiot he was when he was sixteen. There are some vestiges of that boy left in him, but he likes to think it's the good parts: his sense of humor, his badassness, his Mohawk, of course. But being in Beth's life, and now being with Rachel, has begun to pull a man out of the reckless bones of that boy, a man that Puck is actually sort of proud to be.

But he knows that not what Sam was going after, and he isn't mad at the guy. Even if the situation called for it, it would take a heart a hell of a lot colder than Noah Puckerman's to be angry with Sam right now.

His face is chalky in the pale moonlight, sweat standing out clearly along his hairline. Puck isn't even sure he realizes it, but his hands are trembling.

He grabs Sam's shoulders and waits until he's meeting his gaze. He speaks slowly, enunciating every word like his rabbi used to when he would explain to Puck the dangers of sleeping with the housewives who fed him lemon cookies and beer when he cleaned their pools.

"It's not going to happen again."

The guy's face crumples, and he tries to turn away, but Puck won't let him. It's not like he has a strong desire to see Sam cry or anything. He just doesn't want Sam to be ashamed of it, because Puck feels the same way.

Puck is letting Sam cry it out when the door opens behind them, framing Rachel in her cute little PJ set printed with teddy bears. Her alarm is evident in her voice. "Sam? What's wrong?"

She doesn't allow him time to answer before she has him in her arms, rocking him gently. It's funny, because at least six feet, Sam has a good height advantage over Rachel, but right now, judging from the way he just folds into her, you wouldn't really be able to tell.

"It's okay," she's saying, over and over, the way mothers do. "It's okay, it's okay."

/

There is an unspoken pact between the three of them not to mention this to Quinn, who is clearly nervous but also just as clearly determined not to say anything about it.

Puck knows she hasn't been behind the wheel since the accident. It wasn't that her mom or someone had expressly forbidden it, but it was just something that everyone sort of agreed to, like the way kids sat in the same seats in classroom even if they hadn't been assigned to them.

"Should we not let her drive?" Rachel asks anxiously, chewing on a strand of her hair. "I mean, I just want everybody to be safe, and I don't want her to have—any flashbacks o-or anything."

By way of answer, he tucks her against his chest, nuzzling his chin into her hair. "Are _you _going to have any flashbacks, Rach?"

She looks up at him, those luminous eyes of hers shining a little too much. "I'll be okay."

He kisses her, bringing his hands up gently to her jaw, tugging slightly so that her lips will part. Her hands burn even through the material of his shirt, and Sam's question flashes through his mind again.

_Have you and Rachel…uh—?_

"I love you, Rachel Berry," he says, and his lips are close enough to hers that he feels it when she smiles.

"I love you, too, Noah Puckerman."


	8. Chapter 8

[Goodland, Indiana/Leawood, Missouri]

**Rachel**

She debates for a while about even letting Quinn drive, even asks Noah—which she'll admit she doesn't bother to do, when it's a matter of her own opinion—but he's too concerned for her to really think about anything else.

Rachel smiles faintly even while she toys with a strand of her hair, pulling it in and out of her mouth, which is a habit that speaks of the highest nervousness. Not many people get to see Noah's gentle side, because, more often than not, they don't bother to look. It reminds her of how most people don't try to see beyond Quinn's exterior beauty to the just as vibrant person within.

Now, she lays a hand on the other girl's arm, gently curling her fingers around Quinn's wrist. "You don't have to do this, you know," she says. "If you feel too nervous or if it brings back bad memories…listen, maybe one of the boys can drive. And you and I can sit in the back and—"

In way, she's almost glad Quinn interrupts her, which is even more new for her than her appreciation of silence. Rachel has no idea where she was going with that, what she would have suggested—painting their nails? Braiding each other's hair?

She's made a list of slumber party-type activities that she has never actually done, since no one has ever wanted to sleep over at her house, that she's sure are perfectly entertaining. But she can tell by the look on Quinn's face—the way her eyes keep flickering restlessly, never lighting on anyone or anything; the way her jaw is clenched so tightly that Rachel half-expects to see fissure lines blooming in her skin—that this wouldn't distract her, anyway.

"No," Quinn says flatly. "I can do this. There's no reason I shouldn't. It's stupid to—"

She grabs Quinn's face between her hands, cutting off her speech as surely as pressing a chloroform-laced cloth would have done. "It's not stupid, Quinn," she protests gently. "It's not. No one would think less of you if you relinquished your driving duties. I promise."

For a moment, Quinn's eyes are on hers, those fabulous lashes fluttering and dipping as Quinn blinks frantically, keeping back tears. And then she looks away, and her face is still.

"Maybe," she says slowly, "I can drive on the way back. Just not yet."

"You don't have to drive at all."

"I _want _to," Quinn says, with a vehemence that seems to surprise even her. "I just—I can't today. I should be able to, there's no reason that I shouldn't, but—I just can't today."

Rachel sweeps her thumbs across Quinn's cheekbones, the way one father used to do when she was crying, while the other would bring her water. "I told you once that you are the prettiest girl I know," she says, and Quinn's lips tremble into a smile at the memory.

"But I said that you were more than that, remember?" Rachel presses. "You're also the strongest person I know. You've been through so much, and you've had every reason to fall apart, and beyond that alarming pink hair stage, you haven't. It's okay to let someone else take the wheel right now."

In the seconds it takes for Quinn's eyes to move back up to hers, Rachel feels an elbow dig softly into her side. She looks up to see Sam, his body outlined by the sun, which catches in his fair hair and makes him look like he has a halo.

"You're stealing all my lines, Berry," he says playfully. "Makin' me look bad, here."

When Quinn smiles again, as she looks up at Sam, it's strong and open. "You could never look bad."

She moves aside so that Sam can take her place, and she can't help but watch as he pulls Quinn against his chest, the way she almost—washes over him, clinging to him so tightly, like someone has frozen a wave the moment it crashes onto the shore. It makes her think of the way he leaned into her last night, as he wept onto her shoulder.

It was a stirring moment, very _Moulin Rouge_, at least in the end where Christian is sobbing over Satine's tragic, lifeless body. She was surprised at how light he felt in her arms, despite the fact that no one would call Sam Evans small or delicate.

"Sam," she said, over and over, until his name almost seemed to blend in with her own breathing. "Sam, what is it? Come on, let's sit."

They perched on the curb, and she peeked over the top of Sam's head at Noah, waving him inside. After a few moments, she squeezed Sam's hand gently and asked again. "What is it?"

"I, uh—" Sam took a deep breath, released it, shook his head. "I just had a nightmare about the, um, the accident. You—I have them every once in a while, but this one was—this one was really bad, Rach."

Another squeeze of his hand. "Do you want to talk about it? That helps, you know. People undervalue talking, but my therapist says—"

"Rachel…"

"Sorry. Go ahead."

"Um—the way it really happened, you know, her—her mom called me from the hospital, after they found Quinn out on the road and—and, I mean, it's Lima. The police officer knew Judy, she'd—she'd sold him his house…" Sam trailed off for a minute, Adam's apple already bobbing dangerously in his throat.

"And then I—I got over there as soon as I could, and—they were using the, um—!"

He paused, lifting up his hands and curling his fingers around imaginary hands, pumping his hands forward hard as if against resistance. "The, um—what is it? That thing the doctors use on TV, and they always say, 'Clear!'?"

"The crash cart," Rachel said, her voice seemingly coming out of nowhere, as she hadn't been able to feel her lips. "The defibrillator."

"Yeah, that—they were using it on her, Rachel—they were using th-the crash cart on my—!" Sam stopped, closing his eyes for a minute, before continuing. "Um, and she—she came right back, and she was awake, like, fifteen minutes later. And she talked to me. I held her hand."

He bit his lip so violently that the delicate skin broke, and a small bead of blood bubbled up. He ignored it.

"But in my nightmare," he said, his gaze unfocused, his limbs loose and his body swaying as though he honestly might faint at any moment, "she—she didn't come back. And I was too late to say goodbye. A-and her mom was there, and she looked at me, and she said, 'She thought you loved her, Sam.' And I—I said, 'I did love her. I do.'"

Sam hunched over, seeming impossibly, painfully small.

"And Judy said, 'So why didn't you get here in time?' And—and I didn't know. I didn't know."

He bent forward so that his forehead touched his knees. Rachel rubbed his back for a few minutes until he looked up at her. "I love her so much, Rachel."

"I know. And _she _knows, Sam. I mean, y-you sang a Justin Bieber song for her," Rachel said, trying to make a joke, trying to make him at least attempt a smile. "She knows you love her, Sam, and she—she would have still known, if—if it had come to that."

The ghost of a smile that had appeared on his face flickered out. "I came so close," he said, his voice a fraying thread of sound. "God, so close to losing her."

She leaned against him, a silent offering, and when his arms came around her, she returned the gesture. "We all did."

Later, when she'd been curled up against Noah in their motel bed, Rachel thought about what she would do if it was Noah whom she'd almost lost. If she'd even agree to this road trip. If she would actually ever let him out of the house.

She laughed quietly to herself, picturing her boyfriend encapsulated in pink fuzzy pajamas—for maximum comfort of both the physical and emotional variety—and laid up in her bed, with Rachel hovering as an anxious warden beside him.

Oddly, the image soothed her, and heralded pleasant dreams.

/

She and Quinn end up in the backseat together, and she finds her head bobbing onto and off of Quinn's shoulder as the sun sinks slowly toward the trees lining the highway that takes them from Indiana into Illinois.

"It's okay, Rach," Quinn says, laughter curling her words up at the edges. "I won't bite."

Rachel smiles reflexively, but there's still a part of her that holds on to the downtrodden sophomore she used to be, the one who felt as though she were nothing but a nuisance to everyone she wanted to love her, including the girl whose perfume she accidentally sprayed onto her own skin this morning because they were getting ready less than a foot away from each other in the bathroom.

Her head drops onto Quinn's shoulder, and Quinn leans her cheek against it companionably for a few seconds. Up front, Sam and Noah are heatedly debating the merits of the _Star Wars _prequels that had come out a few years previously.

"Total crap," Sam is saying. "Absolute crap. A disgrace, actually."

"Dude, come on. The special affects alone were—"

"It doesn't matter. It just doesn't matter."

"Of course it matters!"

She can feel it when Quinn smiles. "They're idiots," she murmurs in Rachel's ear.

Rachel giggles. "But our idiots."

"Our idiots," Quinn agrees.

They pass the rest of the drive to the next motel reaching forward to steal things from the boys—Noah's gum, Sam's keychain, the travel mug that sits between them in the cup holder—just to see how long it takes before they notice.

Twenty minutes after she and Noah have unpacked their room, he searches his pockets and asks, "Have you seen my Stride?"


	9. Chapter 9

[Missouri-Oklahoma border/Prue, Oklahoma]

**Sam**

If he hadn't been looking at Quinn—and what are the chances of that, really, since he's almost always looking at her—he would have missed it. And even though he did see it, he still can't quite believe it, replaying the moment over and over in his head like he's looking for some hint that it's just CG magic.

He doesn't want to ask her about it until they're alone, but there is a four hour car ride ahead of them as they leave Missouri and head to the next town big enough for a motel. He has to fight the urge to fabricate a need to search her bags—_oh, sorry, babe! I dropped it and everything spilled conveniently on the ground!_—because he really, really wants to know for sure, but Sam knows full well that Quinn is smart enough to see through that.

Not to mention that he blushes way too easily to be a good liar.

They took a vote and decided that it will be between him and Rachel to drive now, because Quinn just isn't ready and because Puck almost got them pulled over at least four times. So Puck is sulking in the backseat with Rachel, who is trying to pry a smile out of him, and Quinn is in the passenger seat next to Sam, her nose in a book.

When his family lived in the motel, and Quinn used to help him babysit his brother and sister, she would read to them. Old Goosebumps books that she hadn't gotten rid of, a few young adult novels she checked out from the library that she'd read when she was a kid, the _Hunger Games_—the twins had absolutely loved it, and to his surprise, so had Sam.

His dyslexia had always made him feel stupid, even though he knew it wasn't his fault, wasn't like he couldn't grasp the concepts. It just frustrated him, and so he'd turned to sports instead, where it didn't matter that he got m's and w's or d's and b's mixed up. Comic books had been his substitute for books, since the pictures stayed the same even when the words screwed up.

So, all in all, Sam had never been much of a reader. But listening to Quinn lead his siblings through Panem, changing her voice for all the characters, even Haymitch, Sam had been just as transported as Stacy and Stevie. He would have stayed in that shabby little room forever if it meant she never stopped reading.

Her voice is one of the central sounds of his world, a chord that can make any place feel like home. They're at a stoplight now, and she must feel the weight of his gaze on her, because she looks up, smiles.

After all this time, not just of being with her but of knowing her, that smile still has the power to knock the breath out of him.

"What?" she says, and he shakes his head, momentarily dumbfounded.

"Nothing," he finally manages. "Uh—what are you reading?"

She shows him the title, and he notices that this book is shabby, one corner of the cover almost falling off, white cracks like strands of a spider web running up and down its spine. _Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close _is printed in white letters upon a red handprint, along with the author's name. Its condition, along with the careful way she holds it, almost cradling it, tells him it's a special favorite of hers.

"Read to me?" he asks, angling his chin downward and peering up at her through his eyelashes. "Please?"

Quinn laughs and reaches out to cup his jaw. 'Don't give me that face," she says. "I'll do it."

In the backseat, Rachel says, _Shhh!_, and Puck frowns but complies. She flips back to the beginning.

By the time they reach Prue, Oklahoma, they're on page seventeen and Quinn's voice is becoming hoarse, but she doesn't stop, not even when Sam pulls into a parking space in the motel lot.

_It's so painful to think, and tell me, what did thinking ever do for me, to what great place did thinking ever bring me? I think and think and think, I've thought myself out of happiness one million times but never once into it. _

Sam finds himself oddly moved, his throat lined with tears, and he glances back to see Rachel dabbing her eyes on her sleeve. "Thank you," Rachel says quietly. "Thank you, Quinn."

Color rises in her cheeks and she shrugs, but the shy little way she turns her head tells Sam more than a smile would that she's happy. "My pleasure."

As they're walking toward their room, Sam manfully insisting he carry all the bags, he leans forward, ostensibly under the weight of their luggage, and says, "When are we going to use them?"

Her eyes flick, catlike, up to his. "Use what?"

Sam extends his neck just far enough so that his breath falls on the nape of Quinn's neck, which raises an appreciable little shiver. "The condoms."

Quinn's hand lingers on the doorknob, and he catches the glint of her grin, the neon light of the motel sign reflecting off her teeth. Heat ripples down his spine, because this is answer enough.

/

They wait until they're sure Puck and Rachel are asleep, when his guttural snore drifts through the thin wall separating their rooms. The bed is across the room, beneath a rectangular window hung with chintz window treatments that look as if they haven't been washed since Sam was about five.

It's not the ideal place—the ideal place would be a sunlit suite in Paris or maybe Rome, a large bed hung with flowing white curtains that they could pull together and hide from the world behind—but it's the ideal girl, and she's really all he needs.

The package of Trojans is waiting on the bedside table, and they're standing beside the bed, her hands resting uncertainly on his waist.

"Are you ready?" she asks, with genuine concern and doubt, as though he actually might not be, and when he nods, she kisses him.

That's all it takes, this one kiss, this unexpectedly raw, searing kiss, and everything is different. He's clutching her to him like she's the only thing that could possibly keep him above water in a tumultuous sea, and she's holding on just as tightly.

Sam usually prides himself on keeping control, even when his jeans are getting tighter and tighter and desire is like a battering ram in his brain, demanding more, more, more. But right now, with all the inhibitions stripped away, Sam can't help himself. His fingers, usually curled safely around her arms, are now moving everywhere, restless, silent beggars.

God, he wants her, he's never wanted anyone so badly in his life; it's not even desire so much as a need, a need just as deep as the drive to breathe. He's already making these hoarse, desperate sounds, and—_oh, shit—_her hands keep slipping below his waist and she's never done that before but it still feels blissfully natural.

He doesn't quite remember how their clothes end up on the floor in a mixed heap—his jeans tangled with her dress, her panties on top of his shirt—but then they're both completely undressed, and he honestly can't keep himself from staring at her.

"Perfect," he breathes, not conscious at all of any desire to speak, as if the word had materialized on his tongue and brushed right from his lips without any direction from his brain. "Oh, God…"

Sam's eyes slip from her toned thighs, skipping shyly up to the pale cliffs of her hips, her flat stomach. His gaze remains unabashedly focused on her breasts for a long time, until she sidles forward and takes his wrists.

"Touch me."

Moving his hands forward, he wraps his fingers around her ribcage, just beneath her breasts, and slowly sweeps his thumbs upward. She whimpers low in her throat and her head falls back. Sam, emboldened, pulls her against him, moving his hands down her back.

He has held her a thousand times before, and it's been sweet, intimate. But the feeling of her bare skin pressed against his is the most incredible feeling, and he brings his lips to her neck, kissing up her throat and her jaw until they're by her ear.

"We can still stop," he says, even though he seriously feels as if he might die if they do, even though he's so hard that it's almost painful. "Tell me if you're not ready, and we'll stop. I promise I'll understand, Quinn."

He lifts his head to look at her, and he thinks that she has never looked so lovely. Her naked body is beautiful, flawless, but it's more than that. It's the way she's looking at him—desire, love, and trust.

"I'm ready," she says. "I want you, Sam."

She kisses him again, and as he's kissing her back, he lays her down. He moves over her, and when she reaches for the package of Trojans, he bites his lip, heat building in his lower abdomen.

Quinn slicks the condom onto him, caressing him, and he squeezes his eyes shut. Sam carefully positions himself, and he waits, again, for her confirmation.

"I want you," Quinn repeats, and now there's a keen edge of desperation in her voice that moves his hips forward, into her.

"God—!" he gasps, conscious by only a few slender threats connecting him to reality that the motel walls are thin enough to permit Puckerman's snoring. "Oh, God—Quinn—!"

He begins to rock his hips, peeking at once to see if he's hurting her, and he goes as slowly as he possibly can until—_sweet Jesus—_she's canting her hips up to meet him.

Sam buries his face in the curve of her neck, moving faster, low moans beginning to fall from his mouth and then she's right in his ear, crying out in pleasure, saying his name, and it's too much, it's all wonderfully too much for them both, and—

Her orgasm triggers his like clockwork, and he doesn't even notice the way her fingernails were clawing into his back until they fall away. He curls carefully onto his side, afraid now of being too rough, and he cradles her face in one palm, and she closes her eyes, her eyelashes brushing against his thumb.

He feels like crying, partly from raw emotion, from love, and partly because the weight of lost time is more crushing to him in this moment than any other. The months with Santana, with Mercedes—whom he'd genuinely had feelings for, if he's being fair—the women who frequented the strip clubs, one of whom had taken his virginity, had taken the moment that should have been with Quinn. And she had been kind, gentle, even affectionate, but he'd known that it wasn't…right.

"Sam," she murmurs throatily. "Come back."

He frowns at her. "I'm right here."

"In body," she says, and then touches his forehead. "But _you _aren't here. I want you to be here with me right now."

He ghosts his lips across her forehead, sweeps them down her cheekbone, until they meet her own lips. "There's no place else I'd rather be, beautiful girl."


	10. Chapter 10

[Prue, Oklahoma/Del Sol-Loma Linda, Texas]

**Quinn**

When she wakes up, Quinn feels pleasantly sore, one of Sam's arms draped across her thighs and his head pillowed on her hip. Flashes of last night flicker across her vision like sunlight shining off the waves of the ocean, and she drifts in recollection for a while, her fingers absently stroking Sam's hair.

They woke up several times in the middle of the night to make love again, stirring lazily and finding each other in the dark. She'd thought she was already familiar with his body from all the hours they'd spent kissing in his room or hers, in the backseat of his car, during stolen moments at school.

But she had never seen the constellation of freckles on the inside of his right thigh, had not been as achingly familiar with the valley of his spine as she is now. She knew the toned expanse of his chest and stomach, but the V-shaped muscle between his hips is new to her, and it's lovely in its newness.

She looks down at his back, curving against her leg, and feels a little pang of distress at the scratch marks that arch over his skin like the tails of comets. He seemed to enjoy it at the time, humming and hissing when her nails scraped over him.

Sam moves, not quite waking up, and slips back into sleep. His arm is wound around her legs, his cheek sidling onto her stomach. She can feel it when he exhales, soft currents of air sweeping over her skin, raising gooseflesh. Quinn watches him breathe for a few minutes, enchanted by the fact that he is alive and here and hers, and then casts a glance at the clock.

6:45. Rachel and Puck will be waking up any minute now.

Quinn tugs gently on a lock of his hair. "Baby."

"Mmm…"

"Sam."

"Noo…"

"Yes."

"Sleep."

"Not right now. You can sleep in the car."

"M'turn to drive…"

"No, baby, you drove yesterday. It's Rachel's turn today."

"Sleep."

"Sam."

"Q'nn."

"Wake up."

"Nooo…"

"If you ever want to have sex with me again, you'll wake up."

He reluctantly detaches himself from her legs, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and for all his height and the breadth of his shoulders, looks like a little boy. "Mean trick," he accuses.

She smiles and leans forward, lips pursed, and waits. Sam pouts for a few minutes and then, lightning quick, gives her a peck.

"Oh, come on."

Sam grins at her, a slow, burning grin that pulls her heart out of its steady rhythm and makes her feel almost lightheaded. "If I kiss you like I want to kiss you, we won't be getting out of bed, I promise you."

Quinn closes the distance between them so fast that she almost knocks him over, arms winding tightly around his neck, lips molding a smile onto his face. She feels his palms on her waist and she can't help but whimper quietly, remembering how incredible his hands felt in other places.

"I love you," she says, turning her face into his hair and breathing in that sweet, simple scent of lemons and shampoo. "I love you so much."

His fingertips press into her spine, and he holds her close to him, nuzzling. "I love you, too."

When she pulls away, he's smiling again, but now it's quizzical, as if she's a puzzle that he can't quite figure out. She tilts her head. "What?"

"I just still can't believe it," he says, in the quiet, reverent tones of someone speaking in a church. "You could have anyone you wanted, and you still want to be."

Quinn feels the blood rush to her face and she slides off the bed, turning toward where their suitcases are propped against the wall. "You overvalue me," she tells him. "I'm really not that—"

She hears the mattress creak, and then his arms are around her, his chin hooked over her shoulder. The warmth of his body should be oppressive, even in this air-conditioned room, but instead it just makes her feel safe.

"You are," he says. "Whatever word you were going to use, you are—fantastic, amazing, wonderful. Whatever. You are all of those things, and more."

"You're sweet," she murmurs, which is of course an understatement, but Sam's proximity has always done strange things to her brain.

"Nope," he says, giving her a quick squeeze before kissing her cheek and letting her go. "Just honest."

He ducks into the shower, and when she hears the water running, she pauses in the act of unzipping her suitcase. A few seconds later, his voice comes through the wall, muffled but clear enough so that she can hear what he's singing.

_Forever could never be long enough for me to feel like I've long enough with you…_

She doesn't realize she's started to sing along until he comes out of the shower, still humming to herself, and he joins her. Even then, she's so used to the sound of his voice, so used to singing with him, she doesn't notice until they hit the chorus.

_Marry me, today and every day. Marry me, if I ever get the nerve to say hello in this café. Say you will, mmm, say you will. _

Quinn loves the way Sam feels when he comes out of the shower, whether he's fresh from one when she comes over or she meets up with him after he's showered following football practice. His slightly dampened hair, his fragrant skin, the way it all envelops her in this cloud of—of Sam-ness.

She feels him lift up her hair and his lips brush down the back her neck. She hums and leans back against him, and one hand wraps around her waist. His breath hitches.

"Shower with me?" she says, and cranes her neck to look into his face—his eyes are already wide, lashes flaring like the spokes of a darkening sun.

He nods fervently.

They are twenty minutes late getting on the road this morning.

/

She reads to them for most of the ride, until Sam nods off on her shoulder and Puck is curled up like a child in the front seat, forehead resting on his knees. Rachel turns down the radio until it's a low murmur, and she meets Quinn's eyes in the rearview mirror for a moment.

"How did it go?" she asks quietly, so as not to wake either of the boys.

Quinn had debated asking Rachel for advice over whether or not to sleep with Sam—she knew better than anyone how bad the other girl was at keeping things to herself. She wasn't ashamed or embarrassed about the idea, but she just wanted to be sure of her own decision before it got back to Puck, which meant getting to Sam.

She ended up being caught in front of the condoms, Rachel's hand reaching past hers and picking up a random box. Quinn had jumped so badly that her heels had clicked against the floor when she landed.

"Quinn," Rachel said, her voice low so that the boys, where they were debating between Cool Ranch and Nacho Cheese Doritos. "A-are you sure you're ready for this? Sam isn't pressuring you, is he?"

"No, of course not," Quinn replied, taking the box from Rachel and examining it—_Christ, these come in sizes?_—before putting it back. "It's Sam—he's a perfect gentleman, even when he's—well, anyway, no. He's not. I-I want to. It's me."

A few nights before, when they'd come very close, when they'd both been shirtless and out of breath, Quinn had been so turned on that she physically ached. She'd barely bitten back a moan of disappointment when Sam had jumped off of her, and clenched her hands into the sheets when she heard him cry out in the bathroom.

She'd waited until she was sure he was asleep before she went into the bathroom herself, closing her eyes and clenching her jaw so tightly it ached as she moved her fingers between her legs. When she woke up next to him that morning, when he called her gorgeous—even though her hair looked like gold cotton candy and she had absolutely no make-up on—she realized that she no longer knew what she was waiting for.

"It was…perfect," she says, her voice just as soft, and Sam's warm cheek pressed against her shoulder, his hair brushing her cheek.

There's companionable silence for a few minutes, and then Rachel shyly prompts, "Quinn?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you—do you think we've found the—the ones?"

Sam's head has slipped to her lap now. In his sleep, he snuggles closer, his hand finding her knee and his legs curling up toward his chest. Puck's eyebrows twitch, his mouth puckering, as though he's having a particularly vibrant dream.

"Yeah," Quinn says. "I'm pretty sure we have."


	11. Chapter 11

[Del Sol-Loma Linda, Texas/

**Puck**

"I'm going to ask Quinn to marry me."

He drops the menu he's holding and stares at Sam across the chipped Formica table. They're sitting in a Cracker Barrel just outside of Texas, waiting for their entrees to arrive, and the girls have slipped off to the little store to examine possible souvenirs for their parents.

"What?" Puck says, because he clearly heard wrong.

Sam clears his throat, fiddles with his cutlery, and when he speaks, he's looking over the top of Puck's head. "I'm—I'm going to ask Quinn to marry me."

It is a testament to how much he's grown up over the past few years, and how much etiquette Rachel has drilled into his head, that Puck doesn't call Sam a far less kind and more graphic version of an "idiot" and tell him exactly what he thinks of this idea.

Instead, using what his girlfriend has labeled as his _inside voice, _Puck takes a deep breath and says, "Dude, you're seventeen. She's going to college in a month and a half. You can't."

Across from him, Sam's eyes narrow and his mouth sets in a firm line, a stubborn expression that he's picked up from Quinn. "I'm not saying we get married any time soon," he argues. "I'm just saying—I want—"

He falters and stares at the table for a few minutes, his eyebrows drawn together in thought as if he's trying to find the right words. Finally, he looks up, meeting Puck's gaze directly.

"I want her to know how much she means to me," he says. "I want everyone who sees her to know that I love her enough to want to spend the rest of my life with her. And I want to know that she feels the same way about me."

Puck reaches across the table and carefully punches Sam on the shoulder, not enough to even jar him, just a gentle tap of his knuckles. "She knows that already, man."

Drumming his fingers on the table top in a sharp, restless rhythm, Sam says, "Listen, I know we've had enough of teenage weddings for, like, ever. I know we'd have to wait years before we actually got married, probably at the very least until after we graduate college. I just…she's everything to me, Noah. Absolutely everything."

The jarring, oddly tender use of his first name—Puck can't for the life of him remember when anyone but his immediate family or one of the Berry's has called him Noah—makes him pause and reconsider the situation.

He'll admit now that he had lingering feelings for Quinn after their sophomore year, feelings that maybe made him act—well, he would say like an asshole, but Rachel would politely reprimand him and ask him that he use a word like "antagonistic", toward Sam. But even back then, he'd seen that Sam was _good. _Which seems like a small word, a half-assed word, but Puck knows that genuinely good, decent people aren't so easy to find anymore.

Sam is the type of guy who doesn't hold grudges, who helps people that have hurt him, who gives back even though he hasn't been given that much himself. If he's being honest, Puck really looks up to the guy, really values his friendship. He might even say that he loves him, in a brotherly way, although he'd probably punch Sam a little harder than necessary on the shoulder or slap him on the back after he said it.

He opens his mouth to say that he understands, that he supports him, but what comes out instead is, "Do you want my help?"

Sam's smile is so sunny and genuine that Puck can't help but smile in response. "Yeah!" he enthuses. "Yeah, I'd—I'd really like that."

Puck opens his mouth to continue the conversation, but Sam saws his chin through the air to one side and then the other, a tight, controlled gesture; at that moment, Rachel drops into the chair beside Puck, and Quinn glides to her seat next to Sam.

"What were you boys talking about?" she asks, lightly pressing her lips to Sam's cheek before picking up her menu.

"Us, I presume," Rachel says, grinning at Puck. "Right, baby?"

"Of course," Puck tells her, sliding an arm around her shoulders and dropping a kiss onto her temple. "Our lives revolve around you."

He watches as Sam's fingers fold around Quinn's on top of the table, watches as she leans on him by degrees—her elbow touching his, then their shoulders, then her head resting against his. Unconsciously, he tightens his arm around Rachel, putting his hand against her jaw and turning it until she takes the hint and brings her lips to meet his.

"I love you," he murmurs against her mouth, and they're too close for her to see her smile, but he can feel it.

"I know," she says pertly, and he laughs, but he sobers when she adds, "I love you, too."

Puck kisses her again, and thinks about how lucky he is, that this mind-numbingly talented girl, this angel-voiced star, wants anything to do with him at all, let alone wants to be with him—especially after the way he treated her.

Guilt still plagues him about this, and he suspects that Quinn feels the same way. The Slushee facials, the nasty taunts, the way they would cluster together in a show of superiority and camaraderie as they laughed at her, at all of them. He knows Rachel thinks about it, too, when his tone is a little too harsh or Quinn gives her a particularly cold look.

He and Q know better than anyone how much a person can change, that your past doesn't define you—but they also know that it leaves indelible scars, nonetheless.

He pulls back as the waiter arrives to take their orders, and when he catches Quinn's eye, she's giving him a knowing look. They're not at all suited for each other as a couple, but there isn't anyone who knows him quite like she does; maybe it's the inherent bond of making another human being together, or maybe it's just because their personalities are similar at the core. Or maybe it's just the simple fact people just click sometimes, on one level or another.

She smiles at him gently, and he thinks about how he hasn't always been so nice to her, either.

Puck's gaze shifts to Sam, who still looks at Quinn with this mixture of awe and gratitude, who holds open doors for her and pulls back her chair, who always waits for her to start eating before he does. He remembers how, in the aftermath of the accident, Sam became such a fixture at the hospital that doctors knew him by name and nurses began bringing him coffee.

At 17, Sam is already what most men aspire to be—forgiving, generous, kind. He treats Quinn like—like better than a queen, like an angel. As Puck is watching them, Sam leans forward and nuzzles aside the curtain of Quinn's hair to whisper in her ear, and she laughs. People at other tables turn their heads to look; some of them smile.

Puck thinks that if there's anyone who could make a long engagement work, it's the couple across from him.

/

"Hey, Rach?"

Her voice drifts from the bathroom, where she's going through her adorably absurd nightly ritual. "Yes, Noah?"

"Um—" He hesitates, uncertain if now is the time to bring this up, if it'll just stir up the silt of her memory and dirty the waters

But then she pokes her head around the door, and with her hair pulled back in a loose ponytail, her face scrubbed clean, he thinks he hasn't ever seen her look so beautiful. "What is it?"

"Y-you know I'm—I'm sorry about—before, right? Like, how sh—how badly I treated you."

For a moment, a truly horrible moment, her face freezes and he feels like he's swallowed a hailstone. And then she comes forward and wraps her arms around his waist, her face tucking against his shoulder. He holds her close to him, enjoying the sensation of her breathing and the beating of her heart.

"I know you are," she says finally, looking up at him and tapping his chin with her lips. "I-I'm not going to lie and say that I don't think about it, but of course, I know you're sorry. In a way, it makes our relationship stronger. We've been through so much together, and we're still standing."

They've been together ever since the botched wedding, when Finn's ultimatum had fallen flat—_"It's now or never."_—and their relationship had taken its final turn for the worse. Puck was the one who picked up the pieces, the one who showed her that love doesn't have to make you feel like your ribs are caving in on you.

"Yeah," he says now. "We are."

Later, she curls up against him, humming with contentment and she pulls his arms around her, which makes him laugh quietly. She giggles in response, and her breath is deep and even only a few minutes later.

Sam's words come back to him now—_I want her to know how much she means to me…she's everything…_—and as Rachel murmurs in her dreams, something that sounds like, "Hello, twelve…hello, thirteen", Noah Puckerman begins to think that he didn't agree to help Sam just because he likes the guy.

It's also because he knows exactly how it feels, to love someone so much that you just want to wave a big fucking banner above your head and let everybody know it.

He feels this way about Rachel.


	12. Chapter 12

[Del Sol-Loma Linda, Texas/Ojo Amarillo, New Mexico]

**Rachel**

Of course she is the one who spots the sign first, as if the very word can draw her attention like a magnet to true north. The black letters seem to float off the white background of the sign, teasing her, calling out to her from above the dingy brick building.

"Karaoke!" she squeals, bouncing and rocking against her seatbelt, and leans forward to grab Sam's shoulders around the headrest of the driver's seat. "Sam! _Sam! _Karaoke!"

Quinn laughs. "Baby, pull over there before Rachel swallows her tongue."

Sam obediently turns the wheel and guides them into the parking lot of Café Nueve, which offers a $100 cash prize to the winner of their weekly karaoke contest.

Rachel bounds out of the car with all the enthusiasm of a puppy and almost vibrates with anticipation. It's been ages since she performed in front of a new crowd—even her stunning solos in front of the glee club began to lose their edge after a while, because everyone expected her to be as stellar as she was. But these strangers will be freshly enamored, and she eagerly awaits their applause and their awestruck faces.

"Come on, come on!" she begs, grabbing Noah's arm the second he is out of the car, reaching out for Quinn with her free hand. "Oh, you'll sing with me, won't you, Noah?"

"Um…"

She sees the hesitation in his eyes and stretches up on her tiptoes, fingers digging slightly into his arm. "Please, Noah?" she says, batting her eyelashes the way she's seen old movie stars do when she watches classic films with her fathers on TCM. "Please?"

He looks plaintively to Sam and Quinn for help, but Quinn raises her eyebrows as if to say, _It's not like you could really expect anything different, _and Sam is devoting most of his efforts into not laughing.

"Noah?" Rachel prompts. "Pretty please?"

She knows by his almost inaudible sigh that he'll do it, and of course, she wasn't really worried because she knows _he _knows how much a new crowd and a fresh ambience means to her and he wouldn't really deny her the opportunity to explore it fully.

Rachel jumps up and down on the spot, clapping her hands together delightedly, and snatches up his arm again. "Hurry, hurry, there are probably already people in front of us."

She glances over her shoulder to see if Sam and Quinn are following. "You two have to sing, too," she says, and preempts Quinn's protest with a wave of her hand. "You have the voice of an angel, Quinn, it's about time you embrace it. And you've always sounded so good with Sam."

This last, while it's certainly true—they are "so frickin' charming", as Santana once put it—is a calculated move that she knows will at least convince Sam. Sure enough, Sam grins and nudges Quinn so gently in the side that she may not even feel it.

"Come on, babe," he says, giving her a grin that would probably melt a glacier. "We can just see if they have Lucky, okay?"

Quinn chews on her lip, but Rachel—well, as would anyone who is watching and sees the way she's fighting down a smile—knows she'll give in.

"If they have Lucky," she concedes, although Rachel suspects that Quinn will sing any song Sam wants her to.

When they step inside, there is already someone up on stage, just as Rachel feared. But when she approaches the man sitting at a small table near the door, she's relieved to find that there is only one more person ahead of her and Noah.

"I'll just go ahead and sign you up," she says to Sam and Quinn, and she swallows a laugh at the little defeated huff that leaves Quinn's mouth.

They're forced to sit through their predecessors lackluster performances, and Rachel peeks at the crowd to see their reactions. She's comforted to see that they don't seem to think very much of the performers, either, which means they will be even more receptive to her talent.

As soon as the man in front of them steps off the stage, Rachel is on her feet and towing Noah up after her. The crowd applauds politely, but their friends whoop and clap ostentatiously, their arms above their heads; Sam wolf-whistles, which earns him a sharp glance from Noah, but Rachel only giggles and waves her hands at them to quiet down.

"Hi!" she says brightly, and someone in the back slurs, _hey, pretty lady. _"Um—okay, this is my boyfriend, Noah, and we're going to be singing Just a Kiss by Lady Antebellum."

It's a song Noah dedicated to her early in the relationship, when they had done little more than kiss, because Rachel could still see Finn when she closed her eyes, because Noah's lips tasted so much different than his that it was like a shock to her system. It slowly became less painful, as she let herself realize that what she wanted for so long was the worst thing she could do to herself, as she let herself fall in love with Noah.

"I don't want to push you, babe," she remembers him saying. "I want to do this thing right with you. More than anything, I want to do this thing right with you."

Now, Noah's voice harmonizes with hers, better than Finn's ever did. A chorus has always been Rachel's favorite part of a song, because that is when you can give your voice license to soar, when you can unleash your passion, your joy, your frustration, whatever story the song may be telling.

_Just a kiss on your lips in the moonlight, just a touch of the fire burning so bright…I don't wanna mess this thing up, I don't wanna push too far…just a shot in the dark that you just might be the one I've been waiting for my whole life._

"So, baby, I'm all right…"

"…with just a kiss good night."

They finish, and as she expected, the place explodes. Mostly, it's Sam and Quinn, making as much noise as they can, but it's still applause, and as she told Finn once—she, like Tinker Bell, needs applause to live. She's grown up a lot since then, and changed, but that will never go away.

"Uh," says the guy by the table, "Sam and Quinn?"

Quinn gives her a pleading look, a silent missive that clearly reads, _Don't make me do this. _Rachel only shrugs.

She's known for a long time, perhaps from the beginning, that Quinn really is a talented performer. Her alto, though occasionally sharp and tremulous, truly is very pretty, especially now that she has had more training in glee club. But more importantly than that, her face lights up when she sings, even when she doesn't realize it.

Music, as Rachel knows very well, brings out the most in you, because it is so simple yet so universal. Even a melody, winding beneath foreign lyrics, can touch your heart and melt away pain, sorrow, fear. It can free you, and it can also be a place for you to stay when you need safety, release, closure. There is no judgment in music; there is only emotion, and what you make of it.

She thinks this is why Quinn came to love glee club so much. It was the first place where she could be herself without fear of repercussions, where she first realized she even had wings in the first place and where she first felt brave enough to test them.

On stage, Quinn and Sam make their way through Lucky. A few people in the crowd begin to say amiably back and forth, and Rachel notices a redheaded girl rest her head on the shoulder of the boy next to her. The redhead catches her looking, and smiles at her.

Rachel smiles back.

/

When Noah tells her that Sam is going to propose to Quinn, her first reaction is horror, incredulity.

"Haven't we had enough of teen weddings?"

"He said that."

"Seventeen is too young to—"

Noah leans forward and puts his palm gently against her mouth. "Babe."

She sighs and reclines against the pillows, closing her eyes, and releasing a thin, whistling stream of air through her lips. "They have so much left to do."

"I know," comes Noah's voice. "But why can't they do it together?"

"Quinn will be at Yale…"

"Yeah."

"And Sam will still be in Lima."

"True."

"And long distance relationships are hard."

"I know." There is a strain in Noah's voice now.

"And young engagements, forget young marriages, almost never work."

"I know."

"But…"

She can hear Noah's smile. "But?"

Rachel sits up and looks at him. She caresses his cheek, and he leans into the contact. For a second, she swears his mouth trembles.

"But if being a true connoisseur of musical theater has taught me anything," she says, "it's that love conquers all. It means more that distance or age or time."

"It does," Noah agrees quietly.

As she listens to Noah's deep, even breathing a few hours later, Rachel thinks about how much she loves Broadway—how everything is so vibrant, larger than life, fierce, just like her.

Just like love.


	13. Chapter 13

[Ojo Amarillo, New Mexico; Los Angeles, California]

**Sam **

He knows everyone thinks he's crazy for this, at least at first. And he knows that he's seventeen, that Quinn is only eighteen, and that even a proposal right now would be ridiculous.

He knows that if he asked Quinn to marry him now, she would say no, and that possibly would kill him.

But this does not change the fact—this iridescent, irrefutable fact—that he loves her with every single, solitary fiber of his being. It does not change the fact that he does not have one doubt about whether or not she is the person, the _person, _the one some people go their whole lives without meeting, the one he wants to be there with him when he achieves his dreams, the one he wants to be there for.

Sam, despite what some people—including himself—may think, is not a stupid guy. His grades aren't stellar, and sometimes he's slow on the uptake. Tying knots frustrated him as a child, and so he didn't learn how to tie his shoes until Mr. Schue taught him. And he still doesn't understand some of the words Quinn uses, which seem like they belong more in an SAT prep book as opposed to an actual conversation.

He hadn't lied when he said he was going to ask Quinn to marry him. He meant that. There is not a doubt in his mind that they're going to spend the rest of their lives together, that they're going to have kids, that they're going to grow old and—at least in his case—senile together.

The drive from New Mexico to California is the longest one they attempt yet, and the moment they roll inside the city limits, the girls are clamoring for a hotel. "I need a shower," Quinn insists. "I smell like asphalt."

Sam leans over and attempts to kiss her temple, but lands on her eyebrow instead. "Okay, baby."

They pull into a hotel parking lot twenty minutes later, and the girls exit the car so fast that it's like they've Disapparated. Sam almost expects to hear the telltale cracking sound, but what he hears instead is Puck's voice.

"You're going to chicken out on me, aren't you?"

Sam turns to look at him, unbuckling his seatbelt as he does so he has full motion. He ends up on his knees, peering at Puck over the headrest.

"Not exactly," he says. "I just—I don't need your help with this, dude. Thanks, though."

He offers a closed fist, and after a moment, Puck bumps it with his. Puck sighs.

"So what are you going to do?"

They both jump so badly their heads hit the roof of the car when Quinn raps on the driver's side window. "Are you guys coming?"

He hops out of the car and slides an arm around her waist as he closes the door behind him. "I think that's going to be decided later," he says, and she laughs and swats at his arm.

"Don't be crude," she responds. "That doesn't suit you."

"Yeah," Puck says, walking toward them around the hood. "That's more my speed, Evans."

Sam's pout is half-genuine. Quinn giggles and pecks his puckered lips. "Don't worry, baby," she murmurs, framing his face between her hands and applying gentle pressure. "I love you for all the things you are, and all the things you're not, too."

He rests his forehead against hers. "I just love you," he says, even though there is no 'just' about it, because the way he feels about her is everything.

She reaches up and gently tugs at the hair above the nape of his neck, which is something she does when she feels like he's being too serious. At first, it was a defense mechanism, a way for her to hide when he brought up the way they felt about each other, but now it's more of a way to pull him out of his thoughts before he gets mired in them.

"I know," she says. "I know that, Sam."

By the time they make their way into the hotel, Puck has already checked out two rooms. "4B," he says, hanging them their room key. "Me and Rach are in 3B, same as usual."

He raises his eyebrows at Sam in a _we'll talk later _sort of way, but Sam shakes his head no. The time for talking is pretty much past now.

Quinn enters the room ahead of him, and when he shuts the door, he reaches out to grab her hips before she gets too far away. He draws her against him, arms looping around her waist, and he buries his face in her hair, breathing her in.

The scent of her is imbued in his senses to the point where he almost doesn't notice it anymore, because he's just so used to it. It's like how you never notice the certain smells in your own house—Quinn says his smells like cinnamon and peppermint—because you breathe them in every day. But sometimes he catches it, when he holds her close enough or when she passes by him at a certain speed.

It's warm, somehow, like he can feel it. It's apricots and cinnamon. It's comfort. It's home.

It's his Quinn.

"I'm going to miss you so much," he says, his voice muffled by her hair. "I don't know how I'm supposed to walk into the choir room without you."

She blindly reaches back and unerringly finds his cheek, pressing her palm against it again. "With your head held high and a smile on your face," she says. "Because…"

Together, they say it, something that Schue drilled into their heads, something that he wrote in both their yearbooks, something that they know full well, just like Puck and Rachel do: "Glee, by its very definition, is about opening yourself up to joy."

He scoops her up in his arms, cradling her to his chest, and she shrieks with surprise and amusement. Quinn's fingers curl into his shirt and she grips his arm with his legs. "Don't drop me," she says, her voice higher than usual with laughter.

"Have I ever?" he asks, and suddenly, she's serious.

She brushes his hair out of his eyes, and smiles faintly when it falls right back into place. "No," she agrees. "Never."

He kisses her, and carries her to the bed without lifting his face from hers. Sam sets her on the ghastly floral bedspread and shakes his head when she reaches to pull him on top of her.

"This is for you," he says, and lifts her skirt, hooking his fingers into the waistband of her panties and pulling them off of her.

He's never done this before, so when he tentatively pushes his tongue forward, through her folds, he's this close to crossing his fingers for good luck. When she moans and presses her hands to the back of his head, he does it again, harder.

Quinn whines, her fingers tightening in his hair, her hips moving against his mouth. "Sam, Sam," she breathes. "Sam…"

The sounds and movements, indications of her pleasure, are so incredibly erotic to him that he can't help but buck his hips against the bed, aching for friction. When she comes, so does he, with a surprised little moan, his fingers clutching at the bedspread.

He crawls up on the bed, curling up beside her, and she rolls over to face him, slipping one leg between his and pulling herself close to him by his shirt. Sam grins when he sees that she's out of breath, peering up at him from beneath her eyelashes, her lips parted and raw from where she'd been biting them.

"What was that for?" she asks, and he chuckles.

"I like hearing you moan," he teases, and when she frowns at him, he shakes his head and smiles. "No, I'm not trying to be, uh, crude. I—I can't believe that you want me, that I'm the one who gets to—who gets to make you feel—like that."

She kisses him lightly. "I have never, ever wanted anyone as much as I want you," she says, and he can't help the huge grin that spreads across his face, which makes her laugh and kiss the tip of his nose.

"Really?" he says, almost squirming with pleasure.

"Really."

She nestles close to him, their foreheads brushing. "You are the only one who has made me feel this safe," she says. "This…precious. It's—it's like—I mean, I know you're attracted to me—"

Sam nods fervently, and she grins, giving him another kiss.

"—thank you. But you make me feel like it's more than a physical thing."

"It is," Sam assures her. "It's so much more than that for me, Quinn. For us. I don't—I mean, obviously, I would want you even if I just saw you on the street because you're so beautiful, but…I want you _this _much because I love you so much. It's happiness in every way, you know? Mentally and physically and emotionally."

She looks at him with her brow slightly furrowed, her head tilted against the pillow, and it takes Sam a moment to process this expression, to figure out why it's familiar to him—it's the way he looks at her, as if she can't quite believe he's real.

/

When he asks Puck and Rachel for some time alone with Quinn, she opens her mouth to ask, but Sam squeezes her hand and she closes it again without speaking.

She rolls down the window when they get to the beach so they can smell the salt air, and she's the first one out of the car, dashing down to the waterline and curling her toes into the wet, heavy sand. Sam follows her at a more relaxed pace, sliding his hand into his pocket, fingers grasping the box.

"I was going to ask you to marry me today," he says when he reaches her side, and she looks at him, one eyebrow slightly lifted.

"What made you change your mind?" she asks, her tone too casual, and Sam would laugh at the idea of her doubting his feelings if it didn't break his heart so much.

"I know you, Quinn," he answers. "I remember the way you looked at me when I offered you the promise ring—like I'd grown an extra head that was speaking Japanese, and it was, like, about to eat your face off or something."

She laughs.

"But it's been a long time since then," Sam continues. "And we've been through a lot…but I still mean every word."

Quinn turns to face him and takes a step closer. "Even the part about the eye gunk?"

"Even the part about the eye gunk."

He gets down on one knee, and her first instinct is to cover her face with her hands. Sam grins. "Wait a second, Quinn. Hear me out."

He pulls the box from his pocket and waits until she's looking at him again to open it. She lets out a sigh that borders on a groan of recognition.

Two days after they broke up, Sam found the promise ring back in his locker, right where he'd placed it himself. He'd ducked into the locker room showers, turned the water on full blast, lifted his face to the spray and let himself break down.

"I'm going to give this back to you, if you want it," he says. "With all the same promises as before, and some new ones, too."

He takes a deep breath. "I promise to be there for you to talk to, no matter how late it is, when you wake up with nightmares about the accident. I promise to never turn down a Skype date. I promise to visit you as often as I can. I promise to help Brittany so she'll graduate this year, no matter what it takes. I promise to listen when you have to practice a monologue. I promise to proof-read your essays, except I don't know how good I'll be at that."

She laughs again, although this time she's crying a little.

"I promise to let everybody know how proud I am of you, not just because of Yale, but because of how strong you are, how smart you are, how you're the one person people can point to and say, it's never too late to turn your life around."

Sam reaches for her hand, and when she gives it to him, he notices that it's shaking. He lifts it to his lips, gives her knuckles a kiss.

"I want to marry you, Quinn," he says. "I want you, every single day, for the rest of my life. But I know you're not ready for that, and maybe I'm not, either. Maybe it's just too hard for me to see past how I love you, for me to be sensible."

He lets go of her to pull the promise ring out of its box, which he lets drop to the sand. Sam takes her hand again, poised to slip the ring onto her finger.

"But I want to make this promise, right here, right now, that someday we'll come back to this very spot—"

He digs his knee into the sand, as if trying to make a mark. Quinn giggles weakly again.

"—and I'll give you a real engagement ring. I'll ask you to be my wife, and I hope you'll say yes. But in the meantime, I want you to have this ring right here, this token of all my promises. Do you accept, Quinn?"

She smiles a lovely, tremulous smile, manages to eke out a hoarse, "Yes."

Sam slides the ring onto her finger, and before he can get to his feet, she drops to her knees in front of him and practically knocks him into the surf with the force of her kiss.

/

[Los Angeles, California]

August 7, 2018

Her hair is long again. His is shorter, no longer in the Bieber cut, and he's trying his best to grow a beard that she routinely teases him for. His college graduation was four months ago. It's been a little over a year for her.

They broke up twice, made up twice. The second time they made up, when she came home for Christmas break, they holed themselves up in his small apartment over a comic book store and didn't get out of bed until she had to go to the airport.

They're about fifty yards off course, but in the end, it doesn't really matter.

"Lucy Quinn Fabray," Sam says, "you are my best friend. You are the light and love of my life. You are my better half. You, simply put, are everything to me. Will you do me the immeasurable honor of being my wife?"

This time, when she kneels in front of him for a kiss, the ring on her finger, they both remain upright, until Sam hauls her to her feet and into his arms, dashing into the surf, yelling loud enough to wake up the whole beach.


End file.
